6 Creepy Victorian Ghost Stories to Read Right Now

Victorian and turn-of-the-century ghost stories have a particular attraction: They need no contrivances to create places that are lonely and old, a place where bad things are kept hushed up instead of dealt with. From the first line, you’re put in a world with no electricity to banish darkness and no 911 to call if the darkness becomes more than you can handle.

The narrator, Jack, has a torrid affair with the married Mrs. Wessington. Quickly his passion dies, his “fire of straw burnt itself out to a pitiful end,” and he tries to free himself of her. But even when he brutally tells her he can’t stand her, she refuses to believe they can’t live happily ever after. He makes plans to marry another woman, and Mrs. Wessington becomes so distraught that she dies, as Victorians who’ve been spurned are wont to do. Jack is very happy she’s dead. But he keeps seeing her private rickshaw around town. And then he sees her. Mrs. Wessington still has love left to give, whether Jack wants it or not.

When the narrator’s young son begins raving about an unbearable noise he hears at night outside their Victorian country mansion, everyone thinks the boy is going mad. Except his father, who believes his boy is neither crazy nor lying. Lying in wait at night, he too hears the noise, the most soul-wrenching piteous crying he’s ever heard. It’s coming from the abandoned ruins of the old servant’s quarters. It isn’t easy to recruit friends and servants to track down the source of the horrible noise, but if he’s to save his son from “brain-fever,” he must uncover the secret of the abandoned cottage.

"The Cold Hand," wherein an overnight guest is tormented in his bed by the specter of, well, a cold hand, is the first story in a different sort of ghost story collection. The compilation of tales in this particular book Ghost Stories: Collected with a Particular View to Counteract the Vulgar Belief in Ghosts and Apparitionsare intended to disprove the existence of ghosts. Its compiler, Mr. Darley, does so by presenting mystery stories for which the most exciting solution is “ghost,” but in actuality is something easily explained. These tales have less style than Sherlock Holmes stories, but the same idea of illuminating the impossible so that whatever remains must be the truth.

Elizabeth Gaskell, well known enough in her day to simply go by “Mrs. Gaskell,” could spin a mean ghost story. Charles Dickens thought so, anyway. He mentored her and published her often in his journal Household Words. "The Old Nurse’s Story" features a sweet little orphan girl, Rosamund, that the Old Nurse devoted her own youth to caring for. She accompanied the child when she became a ward of elderly relatives, and took up residence in a grand but lonely mansion. Life was settling nicely for the nurse and her sweet charge ... until a tiny ghost-child began banging on the windows, leading little Rosamund up into freezing hills behind the estate. It seems the sins of the elderly relatives are demanding atonement in the form of the youngest member of the family.

Saki was the pen name of Scottish writer Hector Hugo Munro, who specialized in wit and satire. "The Open Window" is a quick delve into the style that made him popular. It concerns a man who has gone to the country-side to deal with his many minor ailments, particularly his nerves. While there he visits friends of a relative, mostly to have someone to talk to about his many afflictions. It is on one of these visits he learns of the tragedy that took place out on the bogs, a desperate widow’s delusion, and how formidable teenage girls can be.

This is probably the most stout-hearted ghost story ever written—unless you’re German. Then it’s just propaganda. But at any rate, when the English soldiers of WWI were outnumbered by thousands of Germans at a key piece of ground, they knew all was lost, and accepted it with good cheer. All except one soldier, who remembered his Latin, Adsit Anglis Sanctus Georgius. “May St. George be a present help to the English."

And now we step completely out of Victoriana clear to 1920. But this is allowed; it’s done so that Mr. Lovecraft can be invited to the party. Mr. Lovecraft isn’t the sort of man whose feelings you want to hurt. Neither is The Terrible Old Man, who pays for his groceries in Spanish gold minted two centuries prior, and spends his evenings talking to a group of thrumming bottles that he addresses with colorful pirate names. Unfortunately, the three men that come to rob The Terrible Old Man one night aren’t aware of his sensitivity.

Though reading and writing might not come to mind as the first requirement for trench warfare, during the early 20th century, the U.S. Army became increasingly concerned with whether or not its soldiers were literate. Thousands of World War I soldiers couldn't read printed directions on basic military tasks. The Army didn't implement its first major literacy program until the 1940s, but literacy tests were included in a battery of psychological evaluations World War I recruits went through to determine their mental fitness and intelligence, as the blog Futility Closet recently highlighted.

These unconventional literacy tests largely took the form of a yes or no questions with obvious answers, according to the 1921 report from the U.S. Surgeon General, Psychological Examining in the United States Army. Edited by pioneering intelligence-testing psychologist Robert Yerkes, who developed the military's first psychology exams for new recruits (and was also famous for his support for eugenics), the volume is a lengthy compilation of all of the methods the U.S. Army used to test the intelligence of its future soldiers. Many of these tests are now considered racist and culturally biased—some of the "intelligence" testing questions required recruits to know things like what products Velvet Joe (a figure used in tobacco campaigns) advertised—but some of the literacy questions, in particular, simply come off as weird in the modern era. Some are downright existential, in fact, while others—"Is a guitar a disease?"—come off as almost poetic.

Psychological Examining in the United States Army, Google Books // Public Domain

One test, the Devens Literarcy Test, asked recruits questions like "Is genuine happiness a priceless treasure?" and "Does success tend to bring pleasure?" Another section of the test asked "Do boys like to play?" and "Do clerks enjoy a vacation?"

Other questions seem like they're up for debate, like "Are painters ever artless individuals?" and "Is extremely athletic exercise surely necessary?" Surely the answers to questions like "Should criminals forfeit liberty?" and "Is misuse of money an evil?" depend on the opinions of the reader. The answer to "Do imbeciles usually hold responsible offices?" might be different depending on how the person feels about their Congressional representative, and could surely be the spark for an hour-long argument at most dinner parties.

Still others are tests of cultural knowledge, not reading skill—a major modern criticism of Yerkes's work. Despite being arguably a pretty literate person, I certainly don't know the answer to the question "Do voluntary enlistments increase the army?" A question like "Are 'diminutive' and 'Lilliputian' nearly identical?" isn't exactly a test of literacy, but a test of whether or not you've read Gulliver's Travels, which doesn't exactly seem like a necessity for military success.

Luckily, some of the questions are pretty obvious, like "Is coal white?" That one I can answer. The full list of questions used in the various versions of the Devens test is below for you to test your own Army-level literacy.

While Volkswagen has announced—for a second time—that it's going to cease production on the Beetle, people are still singing the praises of the quirky little car. Here are 10 not-so-small things you need to know about the German car that was once named one of the top four cars of the century.

1. THE RUMOR THAT THE BEETLE BEGAN WITH HITLER IS (SORT OF) TRUE.

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It’s long been said that Adolf Hitler was the man behind the Beetle, and that’s sort of true. The dictator wanted German families to be able to afford a car, so he enlisted automaker Ferdinand Porsche (yes, that Porsche) to make “the people’s car.” But the basis for the Beetle had been around since long before Hitler’s demand; the Bug was heavily influenced by Porsche's V series. Rumors that Hitler directly designed the car are probably false; though he was the one who reportedly said that the car should look like a beetle, because “You only have to observe nature to learn how best to achieve streamlining,” it’s likely that he was regurgitating something he had read in an automotive magazine. Still, one thing is for certain: Hitler himself placed the cornerstone for the Porsche factory in Wolfsburg, Germany.

2. AMERICANS WEREN’T IMPRESSED.

Perhaps still wary of anything imported from Germany, Americans shunned the Beetle when it was introduced in the States in 1949: Only two were sold in the first year. But after that, sales grew quickly. By the 1960s, hundreds of thousands of Bugs were sold every year, topping out at 570,000 in 1970.

3. VW DIDN’T ORIGINALLY CALL IT THE “BEETLE” OR THE “BUG.”

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We have the public to thank for the car’s distinctive nickname. Originally known as the Volkswagen Type 1, the car’s curves and rounded top led to its later, insect-like moniker. Volkswagen must have realized they had a good thing on their hands, because they started referring to the car as the VW Beetle in the late 1960s.

4. THE CAR HAS EQUALLY ADORABLE NICKNAMES IN OTHER COUNTRIES.

The UK and the U.S. aren’t the only countries that bestowed a new name on the Volkswagen Type 1. In France, it's called Coccinelle, which means ladybug. It's Maggiolino and Fusca in Italy and Brazil, respectively, both of which mean "beetle." Mexico calls it Vocho; it's Peta(turtle) in Bolivia; and Kodok (frog) in Indonesia.

5. “THINK SMALL” WAS VOTED THE TOP ADVERTISING CAMPAIGN OF THE CENTURY.

In 1999, Advertising Age declared the car's not-so-small ad campaign to be the best campaign of the last 100 years, besting Coca-Cola, Marlboro, Nike, and McDonald’s. The quirky concept and copy—which, according to Advertising Age, “Gave advertising permission to surprise, to defy and to engage the consumer without bludgeoning him about the face and body”—was a game-changer for the entire industry.

The "Think Small" line and accompanying self-deprecating copy was written by Julian Koenig, who was also responsible for naming Earth Day and coming up with Timex’s “It takes a licking and keeps on ticking” tagline. He’s also half-responsible for daughter Sarah Koenig, whom you may know from NPR’s This American Life and Serial.

6. BEETLES AND POP CULTURE GO HAND-IN-HAND.

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Because of their distinctive aesthetic, VW Bugs have been associated with everything from the Beatles to Transformers. A few highlights:

The Beetle with the license plate “LMW 28IF” on the cover of The Beatles' Abbey Road album was sold at an auction for $23,000 in 1986. It is now on display at Volkswagen's AutoMuseum at the company’s headquarters in Wolfsburg, Germany.

The Fremont Troll sculpture in Seattle, a huge statue lurking under the Aurora Bridge, clutches an actual VW Beetle. An in-progress picture shows that the car was once red. It also once contained a time capsule of Elvis memorabilia, which was stolen.

The Herbie the Love Bug series was a big hit for Disney in the late 1960s and early 1970s. One of the original Herbies sold for $126,500 at an auction in 2015.

In the original Transformers cartoon, Bumblebee transformed from a VW Bug. The car was changed to a Camaro for the live-action movies.

7. THE CAR’S FAMOUS BUD VASE IS NO LONGER.

The so-called “blumenvasen,” a small vase that could be clipped to the dashboard, speaker grille, or windshield, was porcelain when it was originally offered. The nod to flower power became such a symbol of the car that it was incorporated into the 1998 redesign. Sadly, it didn’t make the cut for the most recent overhaul: The vase was eliminated in 2011 by marketing execs apparently seeking to make the car more male-friendly.

8. VW HAS MARKED SPECIAL OCCASIONS WITH ONE-OF-A-KIND BUGS.

When the millionth VW Beetle rolled off the line in 1955, the company capped the achievement by plating the car in gold and giving it diamante accents. They also created a Bug with a wicker body in collaboration with master basket-maker Thomas Heinrich.

9. BRITISH CAR MANUFACTURERS TURNED DOWN THE OPPORTUNITY TO MAKE THE BEETLE.

After WWII, the VW factory in Wolfsburg, Germany, was supposed to be handed over to the British. No British car manufacturer wanted to take responsibility for the company, though, saying that "the vehicle does not meet the fundamental technical requirement of a motor-car," "it is quite unattractive to the average buyer," and that "To build the car commercially would be a completely uneconomic enterprise." Whoops.